acute chemical and pharmaceutical poisoning cases treated in civil hospital, ahmedabad: one year study

background: to study the pattern of acute chemical and pharmaceutical poisoning in ahmadabad, gujarat, india. methods: this was a prospective study of patients with chemical and pharmaceutical poisoning who were admitted to the emergency department of civil hospital ahmadabad, from 1st october 2006 to 30th september 2007. socio-demographic details, intention of poisoning, type of poison, duration of hospitalization and outcome were recorded in a data checklist. results: in total, 366 cases were studied over one year. of these, 70.8% were male. the majority (45.08%) of cases had 21 to 30 years of age. 71.6% of cases lived in rural area and 28.4% of cases lived in urban area. the most common type of poison was pesticides in 33.9% of cases, followed by household chemicals in 26.8% of cases. in 74.6% of cases, intention of poisoning was self-harm. case fatality rate among the patients was 18.6% while this index in patients poisoned with household chemicals was the highest (19.9%) followed by pesticides (17.7%). conclusion: the prevention and treatment of poisoning with pesticides and household chemicals should merit high priority in the health care of gujarat population. a specific concern should be raised toward pesticides availability and terms of sale. a national concern should be raised toward providing more laboratory and diagnostic facilities in hospitals in india.